Fly Away Home
by LyricalKris
Summary: Because her own life was so devoid of it, Bella always wanted to protect sweetness and innocence in other people. Maybe that was what drew her to Edward, a strange, socially awkward, but very sweet man. She couldn't know the secret he held-that he wasn't what he seemed, and she was the one being protected.
1. Chapter 1

**Dedication: To Capricorn75. Happy birthday, my dear! You are made of amazing, and I can't tell you how much I value your friendship. So I'm trying out a new genre for you. Let's see how this goes. Thanks for putting up with me!**

**A/N: Hey so… I have no idea if I can pull this off. But...let's try it.**

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><p>"Poor little beauty."<p>

Bella Swan's first foster guardian stood over her where she lay in her crib, finally asleep. The woman stroked her tear-stained cheek and sifted her fingers through her hair, at a loss for what else to do with the poor child. She had cried herself hoarse, screaming for her mommy and daddy.

How did one explain to a fifteen-month-old baby that her mommy and daddy weren't ever going to come get her? The woman ran her finger gently over the scrape on the tiny girl's chin—the only evidence of the truly horrific accident she'd been rescued from. This baby didn't understand that it was a miracle she was alive, that the emergency workers had unearthed her from the twisted metal of three separate cars and found her somehow unharmed.

All she knew was she'd been surrounded by strangers for two days now. She wanted her own crib and her own toys. She wanted her mommy. She wanted her daddy. She wanted all the things that made her world good.

Her foster mother pushed her hair back out of her eyes, noting that little Bella looked miserable even in her sleep. "Pobresita," she said with a cluck of her tongue. "Your Grandma Marie just isn't up to caring for a baby, but she's going to make sure your momma and daddy's affairs are all in order for you. We're trying to find your auntie, baby."

The woman sighed. She knew how this story ended. Flighty young aunt. Even if they did find her, it was doubtful she'd want a baby, if the foster mother understood correctly, she'd never even met. "But you know, niñita bonita, you're such a pretty baby. Even if your aunt didn't come, I'm sure you'd be adopted right away. Such a beautiful girl."

She went out into the hallway and brought back a beautifully carved representation of an angel. "Here. This is yours now, baby. Whatever happens, there must be a reason for all this. No one should have made it out of that crash, mija. No one. And look at you. Hardly a scratch. Someone up there likes you, little one." She set the carving on a shelf overlooking the crib. "Never forget, beautiful Bella. Angels are watching over you."

_**~0~**_

"She was not your charge to watch."

The warrior angel knelt before the Council of Judgement, bowed in contrition.

"Explain yourself."

The head of the council was one of the few angels with names. There were two kinds of angels who carried identifiers that separated them from the others: those, like Carlisle, who had earned their individuality and those who carried names in shame as punishment.

The warrior angel straightened up. "I saved my charge, as I was bidden. I—"

"Yes, you protected the human left in your charge, but also the baby girl. Do not change the subject." Thunder rumbled through the space, punctuating Carlisle's words and his anger. "You know what is at stake here. The deaths of humans are foretold. Written. Your charge needed your protection to ensure his survival, but the girl—she was to die."

The warrior angel cringed. "It was too much waste."

"Humans die. They all die. Some of them much sooner than others."

"I couldn't let her die," the warrior angel blurted. "I cannot explain. I simply could not."

"The urge to protect her is at least somewhat understandable. Angels are meant to protect humans. But you sacrificed a life to do so."

The warrior angel bowed his head again.

He had not even thought about what he was doing before it was done. It was a car accident. A bad one. His charge had been caught in the middle, and it was his job to ensure his human came out alive. He'd done so, but he had caught sight of one of the passengers of another car—a beautiful baby girl. There was no way she would make it out alive as things were happening, so he had acted on instinct. He had pushed one of the other cars, and the baby's car crumpled around her instead of on top of her.

Thunder rumbled as Carlisle sighed. "There are consequences to your actions. The child's life is a mystery—entirely unwritten."

No human's life was completely written, but some points were fixed, some events foretold. Angels, like humans, also had free will. Mistakes and choices were made. The baby wasn't the only anomaly in existence. It was a concern. Anomalies could interfere with foretold events, triggering a domino effect.

"And there is the concern of the human whose life you wasted without a thought."

"Human lives are a blink, an instant," the warrior said. "And he will be reborn. In the end, what does one life matter?"'

Carlisle tilted his head in incredulity. The others of the council sat, their faces etched in silent judgment. "Human lives are a breath, and that is what makes them so precious. I have to believe, since you saved the child, that you realize the value of human life. But I will make certain of it."

When he spoke again, his voice rang with the double timbre of condemnation and magic. This was the warrior's sentence. "You are hereby stripped of your rank and position. You will serve your sentence for the length of one human life. The child, Isabella Swan, is your charge alone. You will watch her."

The warrior kept his head bowed. His earlier sentiment, that a human life was the blink of an eye, was instantly proved foolish. To know he would be reduced to watching for the length of the child's life...it made the time far too long. It had taken him millennia to work up to the rank of warrior, and he couldn't begin again until his sentence had been served.

"And..."

The warrior's head came up in surprise and horror.

"I bestow on you the name of the life you stole, the man whose years you negated. His name was Edward Cullen, and henceforth, as will it be yours."

The air rang with finality, and so it was, the angel who came in a powerful warrior, rose as Edward, a watcher.

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><p><strong>AN: SO THAT HAPPENED.**

**Yeah. Edward is an angel. Let's see how that goes.**

**So many thanks to GeekChick and Barburella.**

**Thoughts?**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: To clarify, because I think a couple people were confused, Carlisle is a head angel. Warrior Angel #923082309283 was named Edward as a punishment. He is not Carlisle. The warrior angel who BECAME Edward was speaking to Carlisle. :) Sorry about that.**

**So let's get Edward on the earthly realm.**

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><p>"Don't sulk, Edward. It's unbecoming of angels."<p>

Edward scowled at his compatriot and worse, her use of the name. "You're one to talk. You hardly took your own sentence with grace, Rosalie."

The other angel grinned. "Well, it's never a comfortable thing to be put in one's place, now is it?"

Looking away from her, Edward gazed down at the earthly realm. Much as he hated it, Edward knew he would have to put up with Rosalie for the time being. There was only one other human anomaly in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. A little boy named Emmett McCarty. Edward idly turned away from his own charge- she was fast asleep and quite safe- to peek at the boy-child. Rambunctious creature. He was bounding around his backyard with a few other kids.

"So tell me truly. Why did you do it?"

Edward looked to Rosalie, seeing that as he was gazing down at her child, so she was gazing down at baby Bella. She was studying the girl as though she could find the answer to her question written there. Edward shouldn't have cared, and he knew that. Still, he couldn't help but bristle at her appraising look.

"You've heard my trial same as every other angel." When an angel broke a rule, they were made an example of with no exception. It became universally known-a part of every other angel's memories whether they had been physically present or not.

"Yes, and you didn't answer the question then, either. So I'm asking it again."

Edward looked down at the baby girl, replaying the events of those terrible seconds again. He hadn't even been looking at her. He'd been with his charge, had tickled the back of the human's neck so he looked up just in time to react enough that his car was only clipped. But as Edward had glanced around to ensure his charge's continued survival, he'd laid eyes on the doomed child.

_Not her._

There was no telling where the words had come from and really, they weren't words. Rather, it was an instinct, a part of him. He moved without thought of anything else, sacrificing Edward Cullen's life to save the baby he'd never before laid eyes on.

Why?

Over and over he replayed the scene, and he had no answer.

"Do you know why you saved the boy?" he challenged.

"Yes."

That startled him. Frankly, human lives were so fragile, so stunted, that the idea anyone would go out of their way to save one human perplexed him. "Why?"

Rosalie grimaced. "A century or more ago, I failed at an assignment. My charge was a baby boy. His name was Henry." She pointed to Emmett who was, at that moment, grinning winningly at his mother to charm himself out of trouble. "He had dimples just like those. I can't be sure, but I think Emmett is Henry reincarnated. Or perhaps I just want to think so. I wanted to give those years he didn't get because I failed." She tilted her head, looking down on humanity. "And now, I'm quite certain Carlisle and the council were right in sentencing me to this task. I had no respect for humanity but now…" She shrugged. "Short though their lives may be, there is value in them."

So Edward, still chafing, settled in to watch.

_**~0~**_

The roles of watchers were limited and mostly, what little they could do was enough. When Bella was a toddler, there were times she, like any child, wandered aimlessly near trouble. Once, she wandered near the edge of the cliffs above the ocean. It was only a matter of an angelic touch to the shoulder and her legal guardian raised her head.

"Isabella!" the woman cried, yanking the baby back to safety, and that was that.

Keeping Bella alive wasn't difficult, not for an angel. What was difficult for Edward to deal with was all that he couldn't control.

"This is the life I saved her for?"

Bitty Bella, five now, sat on the stoop of her newest foster home. She was watching the neighbor's children tumble over each other on the grass. Her mouth was set in a thin line, determined not to cry though he could feel the misery radiating out of her. She wanted them to invite her to play, but they wouldn't. The other kids in whatever neighborhood she happened to be living in at the moment never did.

Rosalie touched his shoulder. "It's not because you saved her. Life is difficult, even for children. That is the way of the world. The natural order."

It wasn't anything Edward didn't know. He had seen the suffering of mankind, had observed it since the dawn of this world. But this was the first time he had ever personally been responsible for a life. If not for him, the girl may have been well on the road to reincarnation, born into a life that was not as sad as this one.

"I saved Emmett, and he's happy," Rosalie said. "Your Bella may be too, someday. Just perhaps not today."

Disgruntled, Edward reached out to touch a stray dog. He left in the animal a second sense-the inherent, mindless need to seek out the child.

Bella jumped when the animal, a sleek Jack-russell mix, trotted up her front steps, tail wagging and tongue lolling. She tentatively reached a hand out and patted the dog. When it didn't jump at her, she flung her arms around it.

Pulling back, she petted the dog with exceedingly gentle pats. "Your name is Jakey, okay?" she whispered to it.

The puppy grinned and pounced on her, sending her to the floor in a hail of giggles.

_**~0~**_

By the time Bella was in first grade, she had found a friend. His name was Jasper Whitlock. He had a brother named Peter in fourth grade. They were, like Bella, foster children-the sons of abusive parents.

Eager to impress his own friends, Peter had picked a fight with his little brother on the playground. It was tiny Jasper versus four big fourth graders.

If such a thing were possible, Edward would have had a heart attack when he saw Bella, small for her age, skinny little Bella, hurtle herself into the melee. He was able to exert just enough force that when the biggest boy swung an arm out, blindly fighting her off, he didn't hit her as hard as he'd been about to- hard enough that she'd have flown back and struck her head on the pavement just so. She flew instead into the rough, but not-so-deadly sand. She pushed right back up to her feet with a grunt and flew at them again.

Edward watched closely, but the boys, startled by the audacity of this red-faced little girl, stopped shoving Jasper around.

"You stop it," she yelled at them. "You stop it right now. You are not nice." She stomped her feet. "Go away," she demanded.

When they'd gone, she threw her arms around Jasper, hugging him tightly. "It's okay, Jaspah. I'll save you."

_**~0~**_

"She has no sense of self-preservation," Edward said, watching a now eight-year-old Bella break up a fight between a snarling dog and a bedraggled, pathetic looking cat. He flew in front of the dog, distracting it so that its bite wasn't near as bad as it could have been.

The dog whined, looking to where Edward was, and ran.

"No one's ever taught the poor creature her life has value," Rosalie said, watching as the girl gathered the bloody cat up in her arms.

Quite the opposite, actually.

The state had found an aunt who agreed to take Bella in when she was a baby, but had lasted only two years before she decided she couldn't be a parent after all. Since then, in the shuffle that wasn't at all uncommon in the foster system, Bella had been with three different families.

She was warm, and fed. She was taken to school and kept in good health. Beyond that, Bella was given very little.

Edward watched her carry the cat a mile to the nearest vet. He watched as the foster parents she was with got in trouble-she shouldn't have been unsupervised-and Bella was moved yet again.

_**~0~**_

By the time she was a teenager, Bella had amassed a small group of constant friends. These were the kids who, for one reason or another, had grown up in the system with her. Jasper and Peter-when he wasn't being an asshole-James, Victoria, and Laurent.

Watching her grow up, and by default, watching these other lost children grow up, Edward began to understand the intricacies of the human psyche. Everything was connected. There was a reason behind every action.

Kids who grew up like Bella and her friends weren't doomed to fall into darkness, but Edward understood with perfect clarity why they were more susceptible. His Bella somehow always ended up on the sidelines. She was the one who found Jasper when he, eighteen then, had drunk too much. She called 9-1-1 and stayed by his side in the hospital. When James got in fights, she would help him get cleaned up and would doctor his minor wounds. She took Victoria when she needed an abortion, held her hand, and rocked her when she cried.

All before she was out of her teens.

And it was right around that time that Edward lost his companion. One day, Rosalie was just gone. Edward didn't understand until he looked down on the earthly realm and, out of habit, over to her charge, her Emmett. He was startled to see her there, wearing the body of the woman she'd sacrificed, looking like any other human, talking to her grown charge.

He'd grown into a bit of a wild man, her Emmett. A kind man with a good soul, but perhaps a little too careless with his life. Many times Edward and Rosalie had marvelled at how careless humans could be. They were so fragile.

"Have you ever thought the risk might be worth it?" Rosalie had mused once.

Now she was gone.

"She fell," Carlisle said when Edward sought him out to ask. "She told no one of her plan. It was her choice."

"So she is…"

"Cut off from the host, from her power, from her immortality." He looked as curious as Edward felt. "She's not the first, but it's rare."

Edward nodded. "She had been asking many questions of late."

"I see." Carlisle studied him. "One weighs on you more than others, I think."

"It does."

"So ask."

Edward pondered this for a moment more. He wasn't used to questioning. "The girl was destined to die, and I prevented that. Why, then, did you not simply...correct my mistake."

"Would you have rather we killed her?"

"No," Edward said, the word sharp. "I'm simply asking. I am being punished because I disrupted the natural order, I rewrote what was written. Why then is part of my punishment to watch over this child, to prevent her death?"

"Edward, has it occurred to you to think that if we watch over the humans, then there may be someone who watches over us?"

It had not occurred to Edward, in fact.

Carlisle nodded and continued. "Like the humans, we too have the facts of our celestial plain. It is part of who we are to watch over humans, but it is not the only part. We are charged with a small piece of their destiny, the few and far between fixed points every human has. These things are almost completely unavoidable, and yet there are exceptions."

"Like me saving the child."

"Yes. So the rationale there is two-fold. The ruling class of angels proclaimed it so long ago that we should not _try _to upset the natural order." Carlisle pointed to him. "And make no mistake, Edward. Both you and Rosalie were punished not so much because you saved these humans but because you threw away two human lives as though they were worthless. Humans may be fragile and temporary, but their lives are not worthless."

Edward hung his head.

"I digress on that point," Carlisle said, his tone gentle. "As I was saying. The fact that these things can happen, despite the natural order, despite the foretold and supposedly fixed points, leaves some room for question. Was it meant to happen this way?" He pointed down to the girl on the Earthly realm. "Is there some fixed point that required her to defy the natural order? Perhaps a fixed point in one of _our _lives? You are tasked with keeping her alive, but some day, you will fail. Humans cannot live forever, so it is inevitable you will fail. Is it that the how and when are simply unknown to _us_?"

Edward stared at the high-angel, completely flabbergasted. Carlisle chuckled. "Ah yes. It isn't in our nature to question the natural order, Edward. That is not how angels are built."

Then Rosalie might have fallen in a crisis of identity, Edward mused, looking down on his old cohort.

"It is beyond us to know if we are doing the right thing, protecting these anomalies so fastidiously," Carlisle said. "It is simply how we have chosen to react."

"And Rosalie's charge? Emmett? He is adrift, without even a single fixed point and now without his watcher. So what of him?"

"An anomaly on top of an anomaly. Rosalie is human now and adrift. She too is without a fixed point." Carlisle shook his head. "The council will convene." He looked down at the earthly realm with a strange smile. "Though I suspect I can predict the outcome. Emmett has his angel, and Rosalie her answers."

_**~0~**_

Aging out of the foster system, Bella was set adrift-an adult, supposedly able to care for herself simply because she'd reached the right age. And truth be told, she did better than most people in her situation. She got a job and rented a room in a nice house from a nice couple. She did what she needed to get by and even started to dream of better things.

Given enough time, Bella might just reach that happy place Edward wanted for her. The problem was her friends. Her friends had not made it out of the system with their noses clean. All of them were on the road to serious trouble.

Their saving grace was they all seemed to recognize that Bella had gotten out, that she had, astoundingly, maintained a modicrum of innocence. Not a lot-they had all been through too much-but enough that they didn't try to involve her in their shady dealings.

At least, not directly.

Bella had worked at a comic book store since she was eighteen. By twenty, she had more than earned the owner's trust. She was there alone fairly often and, because she trusted her friends, they had more access than they should to the premises. It was ideal for the dealings they had going. They used the comic book shop as a front for nefarious business right under Bella's nose.

Edward had the foresight of the angels at his disposal. He had knowledge of the minds of the people Bella associated with.

This had disaster written all over it.

"I cannot protect her from this, not from here," he said to Carlisle one day. "This is too big. She is getting too deep without even realizing it, and I cannot pull her back."

"You were always meant to fail at this, Edward."

The angel shook his head vehemently. "No. Not like this. Human lives can be difficult, but she has had almost no life at all. No sweetness. No beauty."

"Some human lives are like that. She will be reborn."

"_No_. It's wrong."

"Why?"

Edward paused, staring down at his charge. "I don't know," he said softly. "But there must be a way to protect her. Some way."

To his surprise, Carlisle didn't argue. He didn't tell him to let it go, let it be.

No. After a prolonged pause, the high-angel sighed. "There is one way. One chance."

_**~0~**_

"Hey, Ben. Check this out."

Bella waved to the kid who stood on his tip-toes, looking tediously through box after box of comics stacked in the corner. His eyes brightened as he hurried over to Bella. "What is it?"

"I need your lips zipped on this one, kid. This isn't supposed to hit the stands for two more days."

Ben's eyes went wide, and he nodded. Bella pushed the super-secret edition of his favorite series over the counter and smiled when the boy nearly vibrated out of his skin with excitement. "Bella, you're the best," he said, and then promptly hurried over to the game table to devour the issue.

Watching him, Bella felt a rush of satisfaction. She had a soft spot in her heart for Ben. He was thirteen, but he looked ten, which was a crappy situation at that age to begin with. On top of that he was, like her, a foster kid, and Bella knew only too well that there weren't a lot of highlights in his life. Comics were his escape, and far be it from Bella to deny him such a simple pleasure.

Bella turned back to her inventory, humming along with the song that had come over the loudspeaker.

"Would it kill you to play something good?" Ben asked, looking up from his comic. "This was before _your _time even."

"Bee Gee's is classic, kid. Now shut it and get back to your book."

She started to dance and sing specifically to see Ben roll his eyes. "Ah-ah-ah-ah, stayin' alive."

As she shimmied, she saw a man walking down the sidewalk. It amused her that he seemed to be strutting in time with the song. He was tall, his red-brown hair tousling in the wind.

He wasn't the kind of person Bella would ever imagine coming into a comic book shop, so she was very surprised when he stopped at her door and came in. She stopped singing, her mouth snapping shut as she watched him.

The man seemed strangely curious and a little out of it. He stepped just in the door and looked around, taking in the shop with its figurines, comic books, and game tables with an expression Bella couldn't read. When people came in here, there was either pleasure in their eyes-for nerds and geeks, this place was a haven-or with derision. This man looked...not quite confused nor incredulous. He seemed to be taking it all in.

When his eyes landed on her, Bella's breath caught. His eyes were green, but it wasn't the color that struck her. No, there was something in them that struck her with such intensity-as though she were staring at infinity when she looked in them.

But that illusion was shattered a moment later when he stepped in the door-directly into a Warhammer display. Figurines and books went flying. The man tumbled forward, his long coat flipping up as he fell down.

"Oh my god." Bella darted forward. She dropped to her knees before him, watching him blink up at her with a shocked expression that would have been funny if she wasn't simultaneously checking him for grievous injury. "Are you okay?"

"I am fine," he said.

"Okay." She put a hand under his arm. "Let's get you on your feet then."

Though she wouldn't have thought it possible given that he'd just knocked over a display, he rose in a lithe, graceful movement, his eyes still locked on hers. "I'm sorry for the mess."

"Hey, it happens. Usually to me, so I'm relieved." Bella smiled. He looked back at her. He didn't move. "Are you sure you're okay, buddy?"

"I'm Edward," he said, his brows knitted.

"What?"

"Edward. Not Buddy."

She huffed. "Right. Sorry. Edward." She offered a hand. "I'm Bella."

He studied her hand for a moment but then put his hand in hers. "It's nice to meet you," he said, shaking.

For some reason, when he didn't let go right away, she didn't either. "Right. It's nice to meet you too."

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><p><strong>AN: Many thanks to Barburella and to Capricorn75!**

**And special shout out to Cris and moospot (lizard whatever…) for their patience today. They've been visiting, and I started angsting out about not writing while we were at Universal today. LOL. It's a sickness.**

**To those of you who asked about a posting schedule, I write whatever my fingers tell me to and I have seven stories going right now (including ofics). HOWEVER, I am usually pretty reliable at updating my stories at an average of about once every one and a half weeks. **

**OH. One more thing. I entered the May to December contest. I'll put a link to the contest in my profile if you're interested. :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Hello, duckies. Sorry about the wait. For those of you who didn't read my A/N in one of my other fics, I bit off more than I could chew, fic-wise. I'm trying to set a schedule for myself that lets me keep my fics updating and still leaves me time to work on my ofic. :) Thank you for your continued patience!**

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><p>"Oh my god."<p>

Edward tilted his head, studying Rosalie up close in her human body for the first time. As he looked at her, she looked back at him. When they reached each other's eyes, he spoke. "It seems ironic."

She blinked. "What?"

"For an angel to exclaim that. 'Oh my god' seems ironic. If only because of how humans perceive god."

Rosalie's lips twitched up into a smile. "Not as ironic as atheists using the phrase. That always amuses me." She grabbed his hand and hauled him inside her apartment. "Now tell me what you're doing here." She studied him again. "You're not fallen. I can see your glow."

"You can still see that?"

"Residual angel dust." She laughed. "Sometimes I see things. Sometimes I hear things. It's like an echo." She sat on the arm of her couch. "Now answer the question."

Edward explained the situation. "Would you believe Carlisle gave me the idea?"

"I would say I'm surprised, but somehow, I'm not. I wonder about that being at times." She looked him up and down. "That's Edward Cullen's body."

Edward looked down at his body-still so awkward to him-and nodded. "It's a vessel."

"I know that, jackass." She waved her hands up and down her own body. "You know who this was?"

"The original Rosalie Hale."

Rosalie nodded. "To fashion a body that has life in it? That's something beyond our powers, but you know that. This vessel had more life to give, so I lit the spark. You, however, are still an angel. An angel can't be contained for long in a human vessel."

"That was the catch. Carlisle warned me I wouldn't have forever to accomplish my goal."

"Then we need a plan."

_**~0~**_

They tried out the backstory they crafted on Emmett when he came over that evening.

The young man's eyes twinkled when he came into Rosalie's apartment and saw Edward there. "Rosie, you know I'm a jealous man," he said, clearly joking. "If you invite pretty boys over while I'm not here, I might jump to the wrong conclusions."

"Says the man who flirts with everything that moves. Anyway, don't worry about him. Emmett, this is Edward Cullen. Remember I told you I grew up in the foster care system? He was one of my foster brothers. Edward, this is Emmett. He's a friend."

"With benefits," Edward said, shaking Emmett's hand as he'd often seen humans do.

"_Edward_."

Edward looked at Rosalie, perplexed as to why she suddenly seemed upset. "What? That was what you told me earlier, right?"

Rosalie smacked her forehead and Emmett seemed to think the whole exchange was funny. He cleared his throat. "Anyway. Nice to meet you, man." He looked to Rosalie. "I thought you said you really didn't keep in touch with anyone from your past."

"I don't." Rosalie herded them toward the living room. "I'm not sure how to explain it. We've been through a lot together. It's a bond that doesn't get broken easily, even though it's been years since I've heard from Edward."

Edward smiled at her. This, at least, was the truth. As odd as it was to see her so human, the bond they shared as angels would never be shaken.

Emmett nodded as he sat. "So how long are you in town for."

"Indefinitely." Edward cleared his throat, preparing to recite the background he and Rosalie had crafted. "I was living in Chicago. There was a fire. Faulty wiring. No one's fault. I lost almost everything, so I figured it was a sign. I wasn't happy with my work or my life, so I decided I needed a change of scenery. Rosalie was gracious enough to take me in until the insurance money comes through."

"Wow. That's pretty intense," Emmett said

Edward smiled. "You have no idea."

_**~0~**_

_It's time for you to take a hike._

Edward was in Rosalie's guest room-his room-trying to figure out how to work the laptop she'd shoved at him some hours before when her voice echoed loudly in his head. Though containing his angelic form in a human vessel did limit his powers, he was not without them entirely. He could still read minds, and Rosalie knew that.

_I'm not kidding. Get out. I'll make sure you regret it if you don't._

He listened harder and realized Rosalie was still with Emmett. They were in her room. They were kissing. Emmett was touching her.

_Edward, I swear if you're still here-_

Edward spread his wings and slipped out of the physical realm, disappearing from the house at the speed of thought. He flew up, glad for the excuse to drop the human facade. Safely hidden from human eyes, he flew without forethought and landed on top of a water tower. He could have gone anywhere on the planet-a significant downsizing considering he was used to being able to travel the lengths of the universe-but there was nothing in particular he wished to see just then. So he settled on top of the tower to think.

He knew what Rosalie and Emmett were about to do, and couldn't say he understood Rosalie's objection to his overhearing. It was nothing he hadn't seen millions of times throughout all the years of watching over humanity. Even when he had been a warrior, he hadn't been unaware of humans.

It was somewhat strange to think of Rosalie consorting with a human like that, but she was a human. She had been for three years now. It hadn't occurred to Edward to wonder about her human life-could an angel really live life as they did?-but now he found his mind full of questions.

Since he would get no answers then, Edward let his thoughts drift to his mission. In the space of another thought, he found himself beside Bella in her car. She couldn't see him, of course. Edward settled back, listening to her hum along to the radio, and watching the traffic. He tilted his head and found himself confused.

Earlier that day, when he'd gone to visit Bella at her work, he'd been fresh in his body. He'd been disconcerted with being contained to a small vessel and further perplexed by the complexities of walking and, well, simply experiencing existence in this new form. He had briefly tried to open his mind to receive Bella's thoughts and none had come. Then, he'd been too distracted to dwell. Now, though, especially hidden as he was from human sight, he was able to concentrate on one task.

Try though he might, he couldn't hear Bella's thoughts.

Interesting. Irritating. Perhaps this was one of the limitations Carlisle had mentioned, but then, why had he heard Rosalie's thoughts?

Perhaps this particular ability only worked if someone was thinking at him. After all, Rosalie had been trying to communicate with him.

He made a mental note to test the extents of this power later. Right then, he contented himself with doing what he was used to-watching Bella.

The ride was almost uneventful. Bella had just turned off the freeway and was moving into an intersection when another car ran a red light. Bella yelped, her car jerking as she reflexively veered, missing the other car by inches. She pulled over, shaken but fine.

Edward was not faring as well. It had taken all his considerable willpower to stop himself from manifesting. He could think quite a bit quicker than humans, and had seen the car a fraction of a second before Bella had reacted, saving her car-and possibly herself-from harm. In that tiny space of time, he could have ruined his own plan.

That was the rub, though. Carlisle had given him the choice. Coming down to earth, taking on a human vessel, he had cut himself off from the celestial plane. All of Bella's life, he had influenced beings in ways humans couldn't perceive. Carlisle had warned him that if he chose the path he was now on, he would only be able to influence events physically. Yes, he could watch all he wanted from a space humans couldn't perceive, but he could no longer reach out from that space. Had Bella not acted quickly enough, he would have had to pop into existence beside her.

Not for the first time, Edward second-guessed his choices. Still, the minor mishaps a human could get into that could potentially result in their deaths could also just as likely not. Had that car hit Bella, it may have only totalled her vehicle, and she had every chance to walk away unscathed. There was no real way of knowing, just as there had been no way of knowing how it would have turned out if Edward hadn't been there to "save" Bella every time she wandered haphazardly into danger. After all, both Rosalie and Emmett lived without a watcher or a guardian to their existence, and they were no worse for the wear.

No, he had made the right choice Edward decided as Bella pulled back out on the road.

Still, he felt better staying with Bella for a few hours more as she went home and went about her business. Watching her, he considered the plan he and Rosalie had settled on, and wondered if it would work.

It had all seemed so simple when Carlisle gave him the choice. He would be in a human guise with superhuman powers. How difficult would it be to get a tiny, young human woman back on the right side of the street?

Rosalie had made it clear he didn't know humans as well as he wanted to believe.

Some hours later, Bella was long asleep and Edward was back on top of Rosalie's little house. He preferred it outside. He found _inside _too confining.

"Edward?"

Edward reappeared in Rosalie's living room on her couch.

"Gah!" Rosalie laughed, putting her hand to her chest. "You have to not do that," she whispered.

"I won't do it in front of humans."

"Shhh. I am human."

"Humans who don't know." He looked at her. "Don't you need sleep?"

"Yes, but I wanted to check on you."

"What is it like?"

"What? Sleeping?" Rosalie smirked. "Annoying sometimes. When there are too many things I want to do, it's very annoying. Sleeping _in _on the other hand…" She stretched languorously. "That's fabulous. Especially when there's someone to wake up with."

Edward looked at her, taking in the smile that tugged at the corner of her lips, the way her skin and eyes seemed to glow with an inner light. "You are in love with that man. Your charge."

She sighed and sat beside him on the couch. "I would lie to you, but you'd know I was lying. Yes, I'm in love with him." She pulled her legs up on the couch and laid her head on them, grinning to herself and swaying. "It's a perk of humanity. Love, I mean. There are a lot of perks."

"If he loves you, why does he sleep with other women."

She smirked again. "_Does_ he sleep with other women?"

"He speaks as though he does."

"Emmett talks a big game, but I don't think he's sleeping with anyone else. I don't think he's been with anyone else in a long time." She gave a little squeak of pleasure. "He's almost mine."

Edward stared. "You're doing to him what you want me to do to Bella. You've used what you know of him, of his life, to make him fall in love with you."

Her smile fell. "You can't make someone fall in love with you."

"Then why would you believe I can make Bella fall in love with me?"

"Human emotional spectrum is complex, Edward. As an angel, you know only pure emotion. Pure devotion. Pure faith. Pure trust. Human emotion is much more complex. You remember we used to joke about songs, poems, fiction? Why are there a million ways to describe it, to experience it? The answer is simple. It's because there are a million ways to be in love, and all of it is true love. Different in depth and faceted, but all true.

"Some love is simpler than others. It's not so much that you can make someone fall in love with you. It's that some love is inevitable. Predictable." Her eyes raked over his form. "Let me clue you in, my innocent angel. Your vessel is ridiculously attractive. It wouldn't be difficult to make her lust after you. You mix lust with like, and a human will inevitably fall in love. Not a lasting love. Not love like I love Emmett, but love takes on many forms.

"It's the same plan. Either way, you'll use your dishonest and unfair advantage to gain her trust. You'll use her likes and dislikes. The difference is simply how effective you can be in what limited time you have. It would take years to cultivate a friendship so deep, she would willingly follow you away from her other friends. They're the only constant she's ever known, Edward. The only thing she knows of love. But you don't have years. I'm simply saying there is little that strengthens a bond as quickly as love.

"As for Emmett and me, I didn't set out to make him fall in love with me. I sought him out because he was the only human thing I really knew, and I needed that familiarity after I fell." She looked at Edward. "I was an angel. That's a fact that can't be erased. I can't unknow the things I know, and that includes how to read people, how to see their depth, to know their soul by looking in their eyes. I see more than other humans, even without the Host, I see more. Does that mean I can't have what others have? I don't deserve his love simply because I know how to read him?"

She shrugged. "You'll see. You hang around with humanity long enough, you'll begin to understand. My love for Emmett is honest. I fell for myself before I fell for him." She laughed. "It's only that I've realized that he loves me before he has admitted it to himself. Such is life. It's a powerful thing, Edward. You're trying to save Bella's life. You need what power you can get."

He turned away from her. "I'm not so oblivious to the power of love. If I let her fall in love with me, it will break her heart when I leave."

"That's part of a normal human life. Humans get their hearts broken all the time." She huffed and rolled her eyes. "Trust me on that one."

"Yes, I know what heartbreak looks like. Specifically, I know what heartbreak looks like on Bella. I'm not here to be the one who hurts her. I want to protect her, not put that look on her face."

Rosalie held her hands up. "I heard you the first time."

They were quiet for another moment before Edward spoke again. "I have a question."

"I expect you'll have many."

"How did you do this? Fall, I mean? How were you able to arrange all this without _them _knowing."

_Them_. The high angels. They knew so much. They knew all thought from humans to angels to all the beings in the known universe. How had they missed this? How had they missed that one of their own, their direct underlings, had begun to question to this extent? Rosalie had been an angel for eons and had given it up. He didn't understand why, and he didn't understand how the high angels had let it happen.

She ruffled his hair, her smile sad. "You'd be surprised how often they aren't listening. Even to us." She yawned. "Now, unfortunately, I really do need to sleep. Can you keep yourself out of trouble for a while?"

He looked at her, bemused. "I'm an angel. I can look after myself."

"That's not what I asked."

"I have an intellect far beyond what any human is capable of." He tilted his head down. "And that includes you. But to assuage your fears, I do know to keep out of sight." He touched his finger to her forehead, curing several minor aches, sore muscles, and the beginnings of a sinus infection. "Sleep well."

She huffed. "Thank you," she said, and she took his hands, squeezing. "I do miss it, sometimes. I miss you." She squeezed his hands again and then went to bed, leaving him to sit and think.

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><p><strong>AN: Yay. So there's that. Many thanks to my lovely Capricorn75, songster, and barburella for all their help.**

**Personal note-My newest book, Finding Purgatory, will be coming out soon. If you're interested, follow me on Twitter, Facebook, or my website. I hope to have news up soon. :) All my links are in my profile.**

**Much love to you all!**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Duuuude. Duuuude. Duuuude. Mina made me SUCH a pretty banner and I totally forgot to say anything. Bonehead move. Check it out. Is it not gorgeous?**

**To those of you who say Edward reminds them a bit of Castiel… I don't understand that reference. ;)**

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><p>"Oh, this is so not a good idea."<p>

Bella hesitated outside of James' apartment, listening to the noise of the music inside. James and Victoria didn't exactly live in a quiet neighborhood, but this was different. It wasn't the usual babies crying, people arguing, sirens blaring kind of noise. No.

James was having a party.

Bella turned around and ran into a wall of solid body. "Whoa, sugar," Jasper said, steadying her with his hands on her shoulders. "How did James pull this off? I thought you said you'd never come to another one of his parties."

"I'm not staying," Bella said. She turned around and started to hurry off, but James appeared on the steps, his arms full of pizza boxes, blocking her escape.

"Hey, Baby Bells. You came."

"You lied," Bella said, dodging around him.

"Hey, hey." James shifted the boxes to Jasper's arms and went after Bella. He grabbed her by the arm. "Come on. You said you missed hanging out. I miss you, too."

"And you said we were going to chill."

"My parties are chill, baby." James snickered, tugging her in the direction of his house. "So I neglected to tell you all my other friends were invited. So what?"

"So your friends are fucking scumbags, James."

The look of genuine hurt on James's face had Bella's shoulders slumping.

"Is that what you think of me?" he asked, his mouth set in a firm line.

"No. No, of course not. You're not like them, Jamie. That's why I don't understand why you hang out with them."

"This fucking argument again?"

Bella shook her finger in his face. "You're the one who tricked me over here. What the hell did you expect to happen?"

"Christ, I don't fucking know. I thought it might be good for you to get the stick out of your ass; maybe get laid."

Before Bella could retort, Jasper cleared his throat. "Come on. Keep me company an hour, huh?"

"Yeah." James took the pizzas back from Jasper. "God knows, you probably think he needs protection from the big, bad assholes I hang out with." He kicked his front door open and entered in a huff.

Bella grumbled, exasperated with herself and with her friends. She felt bad, but she also felt like James was being an idiot hanging out with the kind of people she knew were in there. It was an old, tired frustration, but neither James nor Victoria would listen to reason.

Jasper was a little better. Sometimes.

"They really aren't all that bad, Bella," Jasper said, slipping his arm around her to give her a squeeze.

"They're trouble."

"You're being unfair."

Bella narrowed her eyes. "Give me a break. I know we both play this game where we pretend not to know what we know about our friends, but be real with me a minute. You and I bust our ass working at jobs that pay us so little we actually qualify for food stamps. Meanwhile, you know damn well James sits on his ass playing X-Box all day, and Victoria is out shopping at stores I can't afford to piss in. Even this shithole apartment of theirs costs something. So you tell me, Jasper. You tell me what you think is going on here."

Jasper's jaw was tight as he stared back at her, but he couldn't argue. They both knew it. "I have to figure that a lot of people in there are like James and Vick. Yeah, okay. They do what they gotta do to survive, but they're still our friends. They're still good people, so I can stand to hang around with them for a few hours. Eat some pizza, have some beers, maybe score a joint, if that's okay with you, Miss High and Mighty."

"Jazz, don't be like that."

"It's booze and pizza, Bella. They're not going to sell you as a sex slave or force you to be a drug runner, huh. And yeah, whatever. You and I both know some people in there are going to get high as fuck on a lot of stupid stuff. Who cares? That doesn't mean we have to."

Bella kicked at a pebble and sighed. Jasper was right, after all. It wasn't as though she'd never been around drugs and shady people. Ever since she spent the night in the hospital with Jasper after he drank too much, she didn't like to leave him alone at these parties.

Besides, maybe Laurent would show up. She hadn't seen him in ages.

"Yeah. Yeah, okay. I'll hang out for a bit."

_**~0~**_

The next day at work, Bella wasn't a happy camper.

"You can hardly move your arm at all, can you?" Jasper asked, looking displeased as he leaned across the counter.

"I'll survive," Bella said, moving back to the shelf where she was setting up a few behind-the-counter specialty items.

Jasper made a disgruntled noise. "You shouldn't have interfered."

"You shouldn't be getting in fist fights."

"Man, that guy was tripping, and you know it. I didn't instigate anything, and I can hold my own. I could have handled it, and your arm wouldn't hurt right now."

Bella grunted. Christ, her arm did hurt a lot, but it had been an automatic reaction for her to jump into the melee when she saw the guy jump at Jasper. Grudgingly, she could admit Jasper was right. He wasn't the same scrawny kid he'd been when Bella defended him from his brother's bullying friends. Jasper had grown up tall and strong. He could have easily taken the guy from the night before without Bella's help.

"It was a hell of a punch, though," Jasper said, winking at her.

Bella smirked. Her punch had knocked the guy flat on his ass.

"I brought some of that stuff James tried to give you last night. I think you should take it," Jasper said.

"No."

"Come on, Bella. They're just pain killers."

"I have Advil."

"You need something stronger than Advil."

"I don't want anything James has to offer."

Jasper threw his hands up. "Fine. Fine. Suffer needlessly if you want to. That's on you." He pushed off the counter. "I have to get to work."

"You and me both. Catch dinner later this week?"

"You got it, sugar."

Bella turned back to her work, setting up the new display. Her arm ached from her fingers to her shoulders. Badly. Worse than that, her finger strength was down to almost nothing. The pain made her shaky and a little nauseated. Punching the idiot had been satisfying, but she thought she might have sprained something. She'd kept the worst of it from Jasper. He'd have insisted she go to the hospital, and she needed her right hand to work.

"Excuse me?"

Bella hesitated a moment before she turned around, taking a deep breath to try to put the pain aside so she could help her customer. She put on a smile, but it faded into an o of startlement when she recognized the man standing at her counter. "Oh, it's you. From a couple of days ago. Edward, right?"

"Yes. And you're Bella." The man flashed a smile that knocked Bella somewhat breathless.

"That's me. So, can I help you with something?"

He tilted his head at her, studying her with eyes so intense Bella should have been uncomfortable. She wasn't. His eyes were gentle-not threatening at all. "Actually, I was hoping you would let me help you."

Bella arched an eyebrow. She gave him the once over. She was bad at gauging age, but he had to be at least thirty. His clothes looked nice. Bella was fairly clueless about things like fashion, but he didn't look shabby by any stretch of the imagination.

"You can't be looking for a job," she said.

He seemed perplexed. "I was considering the possibility, but I'm not sure what that has to do with me helping you."

Bella blinked. "Okay. Let's start over. What is it you want to help me with?"

"Your arm is hurt." He must have seen the surprise on her face, because he hurried to add, "Forgive me. I overheard you talking with your friend, and I saw you struggling with the display."

"Oh." Bella massaged her right arm and winced as pain shot all the way up to her shoulder like a lightning bolt. She let it drop to her side. "That's nice of you, buddy, I mean Edward, but I'll be fine. I can't let you behind the counter."

"I don't need to get behind the counter to help you. I mean that I can help you with the pain in your arm. Without the assistance of drugs."

This time both Bella's eyebrows shot toward her hairline. "What? How?"

That seemed to throw him but only for a moment. "Do you know what acupressure is?"

"No. I've heard of acupuncture."

He smiled, and Bella felt more at ease. "It's the same general premise," he said. "Except by touch. You see, your body is connected. A nerve in your foot might set off pain in your shoulders. Things like that. I'm skilled in the art of acupressure. If you'll let me look at your hand, I may be able to help alleviate the pain and perhaps even speed the healing process."

Bella was dubious. On the one hand, this could be like any number of seemingly kind-hearted offers she'd had in her life that boiled down to creepers wanting some excuse to touch her. But there was a sweetness to his eyes that Bella trusted inherently. She couldn't explain it, but it was there.

Besides, her arm really was killing her. What did she have to lose? It wasn't like this guy was a big enough idiot to assault her in the store with a bunch of teenagers as witnesses.

Tentatively, Bella rested her arm on the counter and watched him. His expression brightened, and he reached for her. Bella flinched, but his touch was soft. He twisted her arm carefully, murmuring a soft apology when she whimpered.

"Take a deep breath," Edward murmured.

She did, and he pressed the pads of his fingers at the point her thumb met her palm and two places at her wrist. Pain shot through her first but on its heels was a strange and soothing warmth. It was like warm water flowing over ice cold skin, chasing away the chill and bathing her arm in comfort.

Bella, shocked at the sudden cessation of pain, stared at her hand as though it was an alien species instead of an appendage of her body.

"Is that better?"

Bella looked up at Edward, stunned. "Yeah," she said, incredulous. "Dude. How the heck did you do that?"

He smiled and stroked his fingers along the inside of her wrist. Bella should have protested, but it felt good. Besides, she was almost afraid to move her hand lest the pain kick in again. "It's a technique I know."

"Where did you learn how to do that?"

"Oh." His brow furrowed. "I travel a lot. I've picked up a few things along the way."

"Do you travel for work?"

"No. I don't work. I did, but I don't right now. I like to experience new things."

"That's cool. I'd love to travel." Reluctantly, she took her hand from his and twisted it experimentally. "Especially if it means I'd pick up things like this. You're some kind of miracle worker."

"I'm not…" Edward began, his expression alarmed. Then he seemed to catch himself and he put on an easy smile. "It's nothing that special."

"It is to me." Bella smiled, figuring she'd better drop the subject before she embarrassed the guy. There was something strange but very sweet about him. "Well, anyway. Is there something I can help you with?"

"What do you mean?"

Bella gestured around them. "You're here again. Are you looking for something in particular?"

"No, I…" He ran his hand through his hair and looked up at her with a sheepish expression. "You may think I'm strange."

"This is a comic book store. I guarantee you ain't got nothing stranger than I've already seen."

He seemed amused at this. "Well, I suppose you could say I'm the curious sort. That's why I've traveled so much. Something gets in my head. I get curious, and I try to figure it out."

For a second, Bella was terrified he was going to say it was _her _he was curious about, her he was trying to figure out.

"Do you know what Comic Con is?"

Bella blinked, thrown off. "Uh, yeah." She gestured around them. "Comic book shop. Hello?"

"Right. Exactly. In any event, I've heard of Comic Con, but I can't say I understand the fervor."

Her cheeks heated. Of course this guy wasn't obsessed with her. _Ego much, Bella_?

She cleared her throat and got her head back in the game. "But you want to? Understand, I mean," Bella said, wondering if she was keeping up.

He beamed at her as though he was relieved someone got it. "Yes, exactly. Fandoms. Geek culture." He gave her an apologetic look. "I've decided I want to go to Comic Con, but I feel like I shouldn't unless I'm excited about something. Right now, I'm merely curious."

She must have been looking at him as though he'd grown another head, because he looked down. "I told you it was strange."

"Eh." Bella shrugged. "Not half as strange as fandoms in general or anything you'd find at Comic Con, or so I'm told."

"You've never been?"

Bella scoffed. "Yeah right. Out of my league, my friend. Even if I was lucky enough to win the ticket lottery, I'd still have to pay for the tickets, a hotel room, and the flight down to San Diego." She sighed. "We're just going to put that on the long list of 'somedays' I have going on."

Before Edward could respond to that-she didn't want or need his pity-Bella changed the subject. "Anyway. So you want to figure out what the fuss is all about. Why did you pick this place?"

"Oh. It was...random. I happened to be passing, that's all."

"Of all the comic shops in all the world, you have to walk into mine?"

His brow furrowed, and Bella's jaw dropped. "_Casablanca_?" she asked.

"The White House?"

"No. It's from the movie _Casablanca_," she said. Recognition didn't click on his face. "Not a fan of the classics then?"

"Is that a comic book movie? Perhaps I can rent it."

Bella laughed. She clapped a hand over her mouth. "Sorry. It's not a comic book movie."

"No? Then why does it have a comic shop in it?"

"It doesn't…" Bella laughed again. This was the most ridiculous conversation she'd ever been a part of. "Forget I said anything. So what's the plan? What's the first step?"

"Well…" Edward glanced around the shop. "What are they doing?" he pointed to the tables.

"Different things. Mostly tabletop gaming though." He looked at her blankly. "Dungeons and Dragons?" Nothing registered. "Oookay. You're a _total _newb, huh? Wow, how do you explain tabletop gaming? That's kind of advanced geek."

He put his elbows on the counter, leaning in her direction. "Perhaps we should start at something not so advanced."

There was something about his eyes that made Bella lose her train of thought, if only for a few moments. "Um. Yeah, okay. Let's see. How about classic fandom. How do you feel about _Star Trek_?"

"What?"

"Oh, jeez."

_**~0~**_

Edward was waiting on the couch in the living room when Rosalie got back from work.

"Do you know what _Casablanca_ is?" he asked.

"The White House?"

"That's what I said. Bella called it a classic."

Rosalie laughed. "Oh, Emmett is always telling me things are classic. Movies. Cars. Sometimes it means old and sometimes it means something that everyone should know about."

"Hmm." Edward stroked his chin."We'll ask him when he comes over then."

"So you going to tell me how it went or what?"

Edward summarized the interaction he'd had with Bella that afternoon. All in all, it was a success. She seemed engaged in their conversation, always returning to him after she helped other customers, and she seemed to like telling him about things. She'd gone on at length about Star Trek and about how the new ones were very problematic in a lot of ways and Gene Roddenberry would be rolling over in his grave. Despite all her griping about it, she ended up admitting she'd seen the first one at least four times in theaters.

"You're trying to tell me your whole burgeoning dork excuse actually worked?" Rosalie said, her eyes comically wide. "Wow. That's usually a repellant."

"She works in a comic book shop."

"Ah, you have a point. Plus you've got the whole air of mystery thing going on. Who has the time to just _decide _to be a geek? Some girls are charmed by quirky."

He narrowed his eyes. "I'm not trying to charm her."

She held up her hands in a placating gesture. "The point, genius, is that she's interested enough to keep talking to you. That was the point, right?"

"Yes."

"Well, then? This is a good start."

Edward frowned. "Possibly."

She tilted her head, looking at him. "Something went wrong."

"Not wrong." He hesitated. "I healed her."

Rosalie sat up straight, obviously not pleased. "What?"

"It was minor. A pulled and irritated muscle. And I was able to give her a plausible excuse."

He explained, and she calmed. Somewhat. "Why did you do it?"

"I couldn't bear to see her in pain."

"Life is pain, Edward."

"So you've said, but she's had enough pain. I will spare her where I can."

"Just be careful."

"I will. Of course, I will."

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><p><strong>AN: So many thanks to barburella, songster, jessypt, and Capricorn75. Dunno where I'd be without you girls.**

**Well, my gorgeous readers, in case you hadn't heard, I'm suffering from a bodacious bout of depression. It's really made writing this particular fic difficult since my head is cloudy and this genre is VERY new to me. Bear with me. I'll get updates out to you as I can.**

**And thank you, thank you, thank you so much for your support. You've saved me more than once.**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Hello, babycakes! How goes it. My lovely everydaybella has agreed to update this tale for me. I'm so spoiled.**

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><p>"Okay." Bella hopped up on the counter and drew her legs up into a cross-legged position and looked down at Edward. "Fandoms can be intense, so I want to start you off with something simple. We don't want to scare you off."<p>

His lip twitched. "I don't scare easy."

"Says the man who's never been to a convention." She wagged a finger in his face playfully. "Fan is short for fanatic. I'm a fangirl, and even I get scared at the intensity sometimes."

He nodded, looking amused. "As always, I defer to your greater experience."

Bella smirked. She always got a kick out of the way this guy talked. "Like I was saying, we need something simple. Let's start with the reason Fox can go suck a big fat dick."

Edward wrinkled his nose. "Fox?"

"Fox, the television network."

"Oh, I see."

The look on his face suggested he was still confused, but Bella figured she had to be mistaken. Who didn't know the Fox network? "_Firefly_ was a show on Fox many moons ago. It's what you'd call a cult classic. It was a television show—a sci-fi Western. Cowboys in space."

Again, Edward seemed perplexed. "Horses in spacesuits?" he said, only half joking.

"That would be badass, but no. Though there is an episode where a gun wears a spacesuit."

"Oh...kay."

Bella laughed at his dubious expression. "You're just going to have to trust me. _Firefly _is the best. It's super easy to get into and easy to, uh… consume, I guess? It only lasted fourteen episodes before Fox yanked the series." She shook her head, pissed even though she'd been a very small child when it originally aired. "It was a stupid ass move on their part. How the hell are you going to cancel a show before it finds its audience?

"Anyway. You got fourteen episodes and then _Serenity_."

"Serenity? You mean it's so good you die afterward?"

"No. Ha. I've never thought of it that way. No, _Serenity _is the movie they made, and it's the name of the ship. Their space ship." She reached for the model she'd moved up to the counter before she began the lecture and ran her fingers reverently over the die-cast metal. "This is Serenity."

"It's… er… interesting."

Bella snickered. "Just watch. By the time you get through the series, you'll love the ship as much as Mal does. Anyway." She dragged a box of comics she'd set aside over to her and began to rummage through it. "It leaves you wanting more. So many stories they didn't get a chance to flesh out." She shook her head, bringing out a stack of comics. "Especially after the end of the movie. If that doesn't break your heart, nothing will.

"So after you're done with the series and the movie, you move on to these." She set the comics on the counter. "Leaves on the Wind is the newest series, and it's my favorite. You _finally _get to see Mal and Inara together."

"Whoa. Hey. What is it you say? Spoiler alert."

"Oh, please." Bella rolled her eyes. "If you don't know that Mal and Inara are going to bone from the minute you see them in the same room, you're just not paying attention. Fucking Joss Whedon, man. Why couldn't he give us an on screen kiss? Just one. Bastard.

"Anyway. First thing's first. You have to watch the show. Do you have Netflix?"

"I… yes."

"Netflix will be your best friend on this journey," she said with mock gravity. "Firefly is your homework. Then, I bet I'm going to make a killing on commissions because if you don't want the whole line of books…" She patted the stack of comic books she'd brought out. "Well, buddy, you're not worth knowing."

Edward met her eyes with that lopsided smile of his. "I'm sure I'll enjoy it if you love it so much."

"Well, I do have great taste."

Bella was distracted from their conversation when the door jangled. She looked up and was only somewhat surprised to see James walk in. "Excuse me," she said to Edward, and she jumped down from the counter.

"Hey, hella Bella," James said, setting the backpack he carried down on one of the chairs so he could pull her into a hug.

"Hey." She gave him a quick squeeze and stepped back. "What are you doing here? Are you finally coming to the dark side? We have cookies and twelve-sided die."

James scoffed. "Yeah right. I actually like getting laid."

"I get laid when I want to."

"By your fellow geeks? No thanks."

Bella gave her friend a good natured shove. "What do you want, huh?"

"I gotta want something?"

"You usually do."

James narrowed his eyes, but then he shrugged. "Well, this time I just want to take my friend out to lunch. That's all. I swear."

"I'm working."

"You get a lunch break."

Bella crossed her arms. "Eric will be here in an hour. Then I can take a lunch break."

"Okay. I'll see what trouble I can get into and swing back for you."

Just as James got to the door, Edward cleared his throat. "Excuse me?"

Both Bella and James turned toward Edward. For some inexplicable reason, Bella's hands turned into fists at her sides. She wasn't sure she wanted James and Edward interacting. James just cocked an eyebrow.

Edward smiled. It was an odd smile that sent shivers down Bella's spine. In that moment, there was something powerful in Edward's eyes. There was something else there too.

Serenity, Bella thought, and she didn't really know where that had come from.

Edward, his eyes still fixed on James, pointed at a chair. "You're forgetting your backpack."

To Bella's surprise, James's jaw was tense. She saw a flicker of irritation go through him before he masked his reaction and grinned. "Hey. Thanks."

Edward nodded in a regal sort of way. "Of course."

James shouldered his backpack, his gaze lingering on Edward another moment before he turned to Bella. "I'll see you in an hour."

As he left the shop, Edward's eyes followed him, and Bella could tell that James wasn't unaware of the other man's gaze. She stiffened, long able to sense friction. She remembered this feeling well from high school. James got that look on his face, and sooner or later, there was going to be a fight.

When James's car had peeled out of the parking lot, Edward turned back to Bella. His expression was still as serene as it had been moments before, but that odd sense of power had dissipated.

"James is a good friend," Bella said. This seemed important somehow.

Edward cocked his head. "Is he?"

The way he said it wasn't condescending or even challenging. The words came out as a simple inquiry, as though he was genuinely curious.

"James is like a brother to me." Bella looked down at her hands. She had no idea why the hell she was talking about this with a near total stranger, but the words came out without her consent. "We were both in the system."

"The system?"

"The foster system." She tensed, waiting for the reaction of pity that usually came with that announcement.

"I understand the connection then," he said instead. "I have many brothers and sisters in that case."

Bella's head snapped up. "No way. You're a fellow freeloader?"

"Freeloader?"

"Ah." Bella rolled her eyes. "Sorry. My last foster bitch used to call us that. Ungrateful freeloaders."

Edward quirked an eyebrow, looking unimpressed. "I suppose, by definition, _all_ children are freeloaders, though it seems a particularly stupid thing to say in this case. After all, she got paid to feed you, clothe you, and shelter you. Perhaps she disagreed with the legislation of child labor laws back in the twenties."

"I know, right? Visits from our social worker put an end to her dreams of opening up a sweatshop."

"To answer your question, yes, I grew up in the system in Chicago. In fact, I'm staying with my sister. We hadn't spoken in a couple of years, but she took me in without question."

"Yes. Exactly. You know what it's like. James has his moments, but he would do anything for me."

"I don't doubt that." His features took on a more serious look. "However, kinship doesn't mean you actually owe anything to him. Or that he really has your best interest at heart."

Bella narrowed her eyes. "You don't know James."

Edward's eyes widened. "Oh, no. I wasn't talking about your friend. I was making general conversation." Something unreadable flashed in his eyes. "I don't know him at all, of course. I just know plenty of my brothers and sisters got into unfortunate situations. They tried to drag me down with them because they expected that bond would overwrite everything else."

The air between them was getting weirdly intense, and Bella had to look down. She was defensive, and she didn't understand why. "Yeah, well. James isn't like that."

"As I said, I was speaking in general terms."

"Right."

_**~0~**_

Two weeks went by. Edward tried to space out his visits so Bella would think they were incidental. Rosalie had warned him that most women got spooked by stalkers.

As far as he could tell, Bella wasn't at all suspicious of him. She was, however, getting suspicious of why James was hanging around more often. Edward excused himself to go into the back room, where there was a quiet place to read. He listened to Bella and James's whispered conversation through the medium of James's thoughts.

"It's creepy that he's here so much," James said.

Bella laughed. "This is normal nerd behavior. You see those kids?" Bella pointed to a few tabletop gamers in one corner. "They're in here up to five days a week."

"Yeah, but they're kids. That guy is older than _us_. You're delusional if you think he's here for the nerd stuff."

Edward might have given James credit for being perceptive, except that he could hear the man's thoughts. James was playing it off that he was worried for Bella, but he wasn't. He did have the sneaking suspicion Edward was a cop who was on to the fact James had been using Bella's workplace as a drop point.

"Guys his age have more important places to be at three in the afternoon than a comic book shop," James said. "Why doesn't he have a job?"

"Yeah, you're one to talk. Are you trying to say people who hang around not working at this time in the afternoon are up to no good?"

If only Bella acknowledged the truth behind her own words. James wasn't up to any good. Edward knew Bella wasn't completely naive. She knew James and her other friends weren't making their money legally. But she was too trusting of the bond between them. It seemed to Edward that it never crossed her mind that her friends might use her for their own gain.

"I don't like him," James said. "And I don't like him near you."

James was out to save his own skin, and he wasn't even being rational in his paranoia. If he thought about it for a few minutes, he'd have realized that if Edward was, as James suspected, an undercover cop, he would have let him leave the backpack full of drugs two weeks before.

"What the hell has gotten into you anyway?" Bella asked James. "Even if the guy was creeping on me, why do you give a fuck? I can take care of myself, first of all. Secondly, he hasn't even tried to touch me. Well…"

Edward watched from James's thoughts as Bella blushed. James laughed. "So that's why you don't want to believe he's a pervert. You like him."

Bella glared. "Oh, shut up."

"You do. Look at you. You're all red."

"Feel free to go away now."

James huffed, more irritated than amused. "Yeah, I see how it is. A guy has an ugly mug like mine, you'd have called the cops on him already. I'm secure enough in my manhood to see he's attractive. Girls don't mind being stalked by a guy that pretty."

"Jesus Christ. He's not stalking me. Guy shows up at a comic book shop and talks about comic books."

"Have you asked your coworkers if he's ever been here when you weren't here?"

Bella was quiet at that.

"See?" James said.

"That's a coincidence."

"Uh huh. Whatever."

Edward decided this conversation had gone on long enough. He gathered up the comics he'd long ago set aside for purchase—they were on to the Marvel universe now—and stepped heavily so they would hear him coming.

James was leaning up against the counter, quiet and contemplative as Bella stepped over to Edward. She smiled, and he was relieved to see the smile was still genuine—not suspicious in the slightest.

"So what's the verdict?"

"I like the rapport between Black Widow and Captain America in these books."

Bella grinned. "Wait until you see the movies. It's different. Still great, but different. I like her better with Hawkeye than Steve." She shuddered. "And definitely better than with Bucky. That just seems wrong, especially after _Winter Soldier_."

"I thought she and Bucky were good together in the comics you gave me the other day."

"That's just because you haven't seen the movies yet. Watch them; then we'll discuss ships."

Edward hummed. "Well, I'll have to look out for what you're talking about." He pushed a small stack of comics toward her. "I'll take these."

"Your collection is really starting to shape up," Bella said as she rang up his purchases.

"It's surprisingly enjoyable," he said, and this was an honest assessment. Though it wasn't his primary goal, he was enjoying the intricacies of fandom and fiction. As an angel, it wasn't something he'd ever thought of before—the way fiction was a form of expression. There was a lot that could be said about the psychology and psyche of humanity in general and the fan in particular.

Edward was often fascinated by the characters Bella was drawn to.

"I'm glad you're having a good time with it." Her eyes darted to James, and there was something nervous about the set of her mouth. Edward wondered if she would have said something else if he wasn't there.

"Well, what say you, sensei? Do I have enough background knowledge to start watching the movies now?"

She sighed with mock gravity. "I suppose I'll allow it." She pushed a piece of paper toward him. "I wrote a chronological watch list including the shorts and the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. episodes." She wagged a finger at him. "Don't skip. Marvel movie-verse is different from the comics. This is intricate stuff." She furrowed her brow. "Maybe we should have moved on to a simpler universe, but Age of Ultron is coming up in a couple months…"

Edward laughed, and James snorted. Not looking to the other man, Edward smiled at Bella. "I think I can keep up."

"You can try."

Edward didn't realize he'd reached out to touch Bella's hand—a simple brush of his fingers over her knuckles—until he saw it through James's thoughts. Had he done that before? He couldn't remember. He thought he heard Bella's heart rate accelerate, but her smile didn't falter. She didn't pull away or look uncomfortable.

"I'll see you soon," Edward said.

Though he knew he shouldn't, Edward made eye contact with James as he gathered his purchases. The man was practically shouting at him in his head.

To give him some measure of credit, there was now a hint of genuine concern tangled with his self-righteous indignation and paranoia. He still thought Edward was a cop, and part of him was trying to figure out why he was targeting Bella. Was he trying to get to James and the rest of his crew through his friendship with Bella? Did he think Bella was tangled up in their business? Mixed in with all that, he was beginning to wonder if he was actually right about the whole stalker thing.

_Is this DEA asshole trying to get him some on the side?_

Of course, that added hint of protectiveness was pushing James toward the edge of action. What he was going to do wasn't yet a firm idea in his head, but he clearly thought Edward needed to be _dealt _with.

Edward smiled at him, letting a hint of challenge come into his eyes. "Hello, Bella's friend." He turned back to Bella and winked at her, more to get James's goat than anything. "Bye." He turned back to James with a cocky grin. "Goodbye, Bella's friend," he said airily and strode out.

When he was out of sight of the shop, Edward let himself think of what else had been going through James's head.

_Oh, yeah. Bella likes this fucking pervert._

Of course Bella liked him. That was the idea, was it not? He was trying to be her friend, and people typically liked their friends. Surely James was reading more into it because he was irritated. That and Edward had noticed if a human female and male so much as smiled at each other, people around them decided they were desperately in love.

Humans could be rather melodramatic.

Not for the first time, Edward was frustrated by the fact he could no longer read Bella's mind. What _did _she think of him? Did it matter if she was attracted to him? Rosalie and now James had confirmed this vessel was attractive, but what did that mean at the end of the day?

Oh, well. Bella still trusted him, and that was the main factor. If she liked him in a way that was more than friendly… well…

Edward smiled before he could help it, finding the idea caused him perhaps more pleasure than it should have.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Many thanks to Bella, GeekChic, songster, and barbureall for all their help! Special thanks to Bella for the Marvel nerdiness. Woo.**

**Thanks for being so patient with me, kids. 3**


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